Author Archives: Kate

Took this shot on the way down from Harney Peak in the Black Hills of South Dakota. The forests in the area were beautiful. They were full of huge, tall, full, green pine trees, but the forest floor was often open and shady. These forests are often described as looking exactly like the magical forests described in JRR Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy. I now definately understand why. The whole area felt quiet and old… just like an ancient mystical wood should feel.

There were lots of exciting and dangerous looking mushrooms around, but this is the only picture of the fungi that turned out in focus. I think I need a macro lense.

On our second full day in the Black Hills of South Dakota, we got up early and hiked the 3 miles (4.8k) to Harney Peak, the highest point in South Dakota at 7,242 ft (2,207m). This makes it the highest peak east of the Rockies, all the way across the country. Yep, Mt. Washington is only a mear 6,288ft (1,917m).

The 6 mile round trip hike took the whole family about 5.5 hours to complete, but it was worth the trip. The deep forests of the Black Hills are beautiful, and the views from the lookout tower built on top of the peak were simply incredible. The shot below is from the base of the lookout tower, looking generally south.

Keep an eye out for the other hikers on the rock…. waaaay out on the tip. Should give a sence of scale for the photo. The site was amazing.

A shot of the west face of Devil’s Tower at the golden hour. The setting sun was like a giant orange spot-light on the side of the tower.

The route we worked on (Durrance 5.6) was on the south side of the tower, so off to the right of this picture. Still, it was a gorgious evening.

Just got back from a great vacation camping and climbing with Mark and my parents and my little bro Kev. I’ve got almost 300 pictures to sort through, so I’ll be a busy little girl this week. Here’s a shot of an awesome sunset over Devil’s Tower just to keep ya’ll happy.

Took this shot after climbing in Vedauwoo last Saturday. A big storm blew through in the afternoon, chasing us down the rock with rain and hail. As we drove away, we saw this huge swath of land, probably a mile wide and 5 miles long where the ground was so deeply covered in hail, it looked like snow.

Back from a short break… I didn’t forget about you! I like you!

This is another shot from camping in Vedauwoo two weeks ago. I spent some time on it, but I’m still not sure I’m happy with it. I’d like to try some of this HDF stuff, but I haven’t spent the time to take the appropriate numbr of pictures of a scene yet.

We picked a campsite with a beautiful view of the main area last weekend. Unfortunately, it was also completely exposed to the fierce wind as it blasted over the plains at night. But the sunset was worth it.

… Is sometimes just getting down. We had an excellent weekend camping and climbing in Vedauwoo. I will never get tired of this place. We climbed routes we have been on before, but even little changes make them exciting still. In the case of this weekend, we climbed all three pitches of Walt’s Wall (with Rachel), and then rappelled the whole route with two ropes. That was a looooong (200ft) rappel.

The shot below was from the end of the day Saturday. Last summer, Mark and I climbed up to the top of this formation with Tom, and did this same rappel. That was one of the most exciting, wildest, scariest, most wonderful rappels I have ever done! I finally ended up in the right place at the right time to get a picture of somebody else doing the same thing.

For more shots from a great weekend, check out the photo gallery.